The Bitch: 2006 Black Hills 'Alibi', a 100% Sauvignon Blanc from British Columbia. I've owned several vintages of this pale wine and always found them nice enough after a few years of letting the hard, spinsterish acidity calm down, that is, WHEN it did. Sometimes the acids outlasted the fruit, a situation I found intolerable for a $25 white so I've quit buying them. It was, therefore, with relatively low expectations that I opened this, our last bottle, to greet my husband with after a bad day at work, and lo and behold here is the wine I had always hoped the Alibi would be: Katherine Hepburn in a bottle. Not expansive, effusive or especially feminine, in fact a bit strict and androgynous but both in a way that's at once intelligent and alluring. More complex on the palate than it looks in the glass, with light lemon, green tea and oyster shells. Very, very good.
The Bride: The meet and greet part of the program now over, I needed something bolder to accompany the spicey eggplant curry I'd made for dinner and I chose the 2005 Stagecoach Vineyard 'Black Bart's Bride' from Napa Valley. A Rhonish blend with a lot of Viognier and I forget what else (could be chardonnay), this is one of the biggest white wines I've ever had and considering all the California whites I've drunk that's saying something! I believe it retails in the high 40's, or used to, and I have to say I think it deserves that kind of price. Definitely not a wine for those of you who run out of the room screaming at the sound of 'tropical', but this bright yellow gal is one powerhouse of a wine that can hold it's own with the boys: orange blossoms, raw apples, baked apples, butterscotch, July sunshine, custard and pineapple. That kind of cleavage needs a lot of structure, and the wine has it: at five years old it's only just coming into it's prime. Methinks the bride is no virgin. Excellent.
